Newspaper Page Text
8
THE FEDERATION OF WOMEN’S CLUBS IN THE SOUTH
(Continued from last week.)
Matrimonial Goblins a Rare Delusion.
Personality shades off very easily
into character. Tact, good sense,
sympathy, may come under either
head. And, of course, the successful
stenographer must be honest, faithful,
conscientious; in short, she will find
none of the cardinal virtues unhandy.
Above all else she must be ambitious;
she must have the determination to
count for something more than a
drawer of a pay envelope. A think
ing employer told me the other day
that woman’s changing attitude to
ward marriage is having an immense
influence on her standing in the bus
iness world. The higher type of girl
will not marry an inferior man just
for the sake of getting a husband.
(You may deplore this fact or not
just as you please.) So the employer
has come to regard the chance of los
ing his high grade stenographer by
marriage as he does the chance that
she will be offered another position.
It is no more than a probability in
both cases.
This is not to say that the success
ful stenographer must take a vow of
celibacy and austerity. I have no pa
tience with the people who preach
that a stenographer’s duty to her em
ployer includes retiring every night
at 9 o’clock. Every young person in
particular requires a certain amount
of play. For every girl who fails be
cause her head is full of dances and
theaters, I believe I could find you an
other who is depressed below the point
of efficiency by the effort to endure
a monotonous and joyless life. The
world has yet to learn the industrial
value of happiness.
Leavening The Lump With Brains.
When we come to the question of
brains I believe we have struck the
keynote in this subject. A girl may
be ever so faithful, ever so willing,
but if she hath not ability, it profiteth
her little. Ability in this field means
the power of initiative. A successful
stenographer must be able to think
for herself, discriminate, to grasp es
sentials. A man does not expect to
spend his time dictating to a SI,OOO a
year stenographer. He is paying her
to handle correspondence independent
ly; for this two things are necessary—
knowledge of her employer’s business
and ability to write the English lan
guage. She must know what her em
ployer is trying to do and how he ex
pects to do it; she must understand the
situation and the people with whom he
has to deal. And she must be able to
embody this understanding in a good
business letter —not merely a correct
letter, but a good one. She must say
things clearly, tersely, pointedly, and
she must leave things unsaid —also
clearly, tersely, pointedly. She must
be able to write the skillful letter —the
letter which informs Mr. Brown, so
courteously and kindly, that he is a
horsethief and a prevaricator, and
that Messrs. Smith and Jones will be
hanged if they grant his outrageous
demands. You are beginning to see,
aren’t you, why employers are lament
ing the lack of superior stenograph
ers?
There you have the demand; what
about the supply? What are the first
steps to success in stenography? How
must a girl equip herself for a win
ning fight in this field? Well, of
’’INFORMATION IS INSPIRATION”
THE STENOGRAPHER
By VIRGINIA BELL GRAHAM.
A Department Designed to Create Federation Interest and Promote Growth
course, to do the thing scientifically,
a girl ought to go back and make a
careful selection of grandparents —not
to mention more remote and problem
atic ancestry. Personality, charac
ter and brains are not products of one
generation. However, I agree with
you that most of us wilt have to put
up with the consequences of our early
neglect of this detail. We will grant
our aspirant her trio of essentials.
Now, I am not trying to give the im
pression that every woman with those
essentials will succeed as a stenogr
grapher; she may make a successful
musician. If a girl has an uncontrol
lable distaste for routine, if her nerves
revolt at hurry and bustle, if she
shrinks from promiscuous associa
tions, the business world is probably
no place for her. To succeed as a
stenographer, a woman must have the
business type of mind.
And, since right thinking is the
basis of all right action, such a wom
an must rid herself once and for all of
the notion that she is in any way low
ering herself by becoming a stenog
rapher.
We find, it is true, the flashy, igno
rant stenogrhper; we also find the
soured, fossilized teacher, and the
coarse and callous nurse. We cannot
eliminate the undesirable citizen; we
can only live him down. Nor should
the horrible example of Miss Smith
ers deter the aspirant. Some business
men are brutes; so are some doctors;
so (at least I have heard it) are some
husbands. To put it strongly, no com
petent stenographer need stay an hour
in an office where she is treated with
discourtesy and affront; she can go
across the street and find an employ
er of sense and decency. Certain news
paper scandals have given rise to a lot
of vague talk about the moral dangers
connected witn a stenographer’s work.
The business office may be no place
for the vain and silly girl, but then
this sinful earth contains few oases of
safety for the weak sister —God help
her! And this same loose talk may
be used as a cover for unjust innuen
do for a class which contains some
of the finest women I know.
.. Doing the Acrobatics.
In the next place, the woman who
wants to climb to the top in stenog
raphy should equip herself with the
best general education her resources
will procure. Sne should have at least
a high school training. I am not go
ing to drag out that moth-eaten discus
sion about intelligence versus educa
tion, which some imbecile on a holi
day foisted upon the public. The bus
iness of writing letters involves tech
nical knowledge just as does the bus
iness of running a power plant. The
most direct way to that knowledge is
through the schoolroom. Further
more, in this day of general educa
tion, a voluntary relinquishment of
educational advantages requires ex
planation, and explanations are al
ways unsatisfactory references. And,
lastly, stenography is work for a wom
an and not for a child. The school
desk, not the typewriter desk, is the
place for a girl under eighteen.
The matter of vocational training
comes next to the attention. The high
school graduate should find six months
in a good business college sufficient
preparation in this regard. In that
time she should gain familiarity with
The Golden Age For November 16, 1911.
the principles of her system of stenog
raphy and learn to handle various
standard makes of typewriters. The
speed test should not become an ob
session. The emphasis should always
be placed on accuracy rather than on
mere mechanical quickness. “Getting
up speed,” as needed is a comparative
ly simple matter of practice.
Comin’ Thu’.
And now, after the airy manner Os
popular novelists, we shall lightly as
sume that the stenographer has passed
through the purgatorial period known
as “getting some experience,” and has
at last obtained a real position with
decent remuneration and a chance for
advancement. The best place for the
ambitious stenographer is the small
office (not the small business) where
her identity will not be submerged and
her work reduced to mere routine.
Now she must set herself to learn her
employer’s business. In the inspiring
words of the young lady with the laud
able ambition, to inspect the recesses
of her own ear, the stenographer must
“put her mind to it.” I knew a wom
an once who excused herself for open
ing her husban’s letter by the plea
that she merely wanted to see what
was in it. This ought to be the ste
nographer’s attitude toward every let
ter she writes; she should listen to it
as it is dictated and read it after she
has transcribed it, not only to find out
if she has it right, but to find out what
it is about. She must study the work
ing her husband’s letter by the plea
out how T he likes things done. She
must hoard up information to supply
gaps in a busy man’s memory or at
tention. To be sure, tact must be com
bined with all this activity, but when
a girl find that her employer resents
her desire to take an intelligent in
terest in his business, the sooner she
leaves him the better. Beware, my
sister, of the lure of the “easy job.”
As a matter of fact, “there ain’t no
such animal.”
Opportunity Comes A-Tapping.
So, some day (perhaps when one has
just about given up expecting her)
opportunity condescends along with
her famous knock. “Hang it all,” says
Mr. Employer, “those letters ought to
go out tonight, and I haven’t time to
stop to give dictation.” “I think, Mr.
Employer,” says Miss Employee, mod
estly, “that if you will give me a few
directions I can write those letters
myself, and have them ready for you
to sign when you get back.” If Mr.
Employer is a good sort he is more
than willing to try the experiment and
then —well, it’s b°n to one that he nev
er dictates another letter to that
stenographer. In a month he will
probably be asking her to write his
personal letters for him.
The position of private secretary is,
perhaps, the most logical goal in steno
graphic work. The secretary writes
the bulk of her employer’s letters and
frequently signs them. She keeps
track of his appointments and gets
rid of undesired visitors. She meets
his callers in his absence and finds
out what they want. The arduous re
sponsibility of the position is usually
compensated with special privileges,
while the associations it entails with
a good class of people renders it pe
culiarly attractive to the refined wom
an. The secretary’s remuneration will
run from SI,OOO a year to anything the
employer is willing to pay to keep her
with him.
The position of correspondent is an
other opening for the ambitions steno.
Edited by Margaret Beverly Upshaw
grapher. In large concerns, such as
mail order houses, a women may have
charge of the correspondence relating
to a certain department, probably with
a force of stenographers under her.
The publishing business offers a very
attractive opportunity for the stenog
rapher with a college education. In
the subscription book houses there is
an opening for women of education to
handle correspondence relating to the
work of agents in various fields.
Lionizing the Legal Lair.
Law stenography holds out distinct
advantages. Such work requires a
knowledge of legal terms and the abil
ity to make out legal forms. A good
law stenographer can easily make $25
a week, which is interesting in view
of the fact that plenty of men gradu
ates of law schools are glad to work
for sls a week. There is a peculiar ap
peal to the small town girl in the fact
that the best place for a law stenog
rapher to get her experience is in the
office of a country lawyer, with the
time and willingness to teach her what
she needs to know. A short course
in law would naturally be of great as
sistance in this field.
Court reporting is remunerative
work, but pretty strenuous for the av
erage woman. The criminal courts do
not employ women in this capacity;
the chancery and patent law courts
do. Public stenography would appeal
to the woman who likes to be her own
boss. However, I am told that the
increase in the number of private
stenographers and the modest rate of
pay have reduced the profits in this
line of work. A college town would
be one of the best locations for a pub
lic stenographer. College professors
are likely to require a lot of stenog
raphy and typewriting done, but few
of them are rich enough to hire an in
dividual stenographer, and in such a
community an educated woman ought
to make at least a comfortable living
under peculiarly congenial conditions.
As an employer Uncle Sam has two
distinct advantages; he won’t abscond
without paying your salary, and he
can’t fire you because he doesn’t like
the way you do your hair. However,
to get a position under civil service a
woman must not only pass an exami
nation, but she must pass with a
higher standing than her masculine
competitor. Again, she must take the
appointment offered her or run the
chance of not getting another. A
stenographer under civil service will
earn from S6OO to SI,OOO a year, and
there are wider opportunities to which
stenography may prove the stepping
stone.
We hear a great deal about discrim
ination against the woman in the bus
iness world. It is true that she has
not an equal chance with the man for
remuneration and advancement. While
no one will minimize the value of agi
tation for equal opportunities, the best
service the majority of women can
render their sex is to take full advan
tage of the opportunities already of
fered. To be sure, we have not yet
heard of the girl stenographer who
has worked up to be vice president of
the company, but no one knows what
the future holds for the woman of
brains and ambition. The men have
given us a foothold on the ladder of
business opportunity; who can say
how long they will continue to hold
the topmost rounds against us?
“Give me a spot to stand on,” said
a gentleman with a lever, “and I will
pipye the world.”
